The Download: AI companion dangers, and supersonic planes
TopTechTrends
Humanlike “teeth” have been grown in mini pigs
Comstruct, a platform to digitize the construction industry, raises $13.5 million
When you think about platforms in the construction industry, chances are you’re thinking about concrete platforms designed to support steel beams and tall pillars. Munich-based startup Comstruct wants to design a different platform to digitize the construction industry — a software platform. And the startup is announcing a $12.5 million Series A round led by GV […]
© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
Avelios nabs $31M led by Sequoia to fix the ailing world of healthcare IT
The race is on to build a new generation of healthcare software to replace legacy hospital systems that in some cases may not have been updated in decades. A startup out of Munich, Germany called Avelios has ambitions to build a new kind of end-to-end administrative system, leaning into more modern tooling using AI and […]
© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
European VC firm Emblem raises $85 million for its initial fund
Emblem, a relatively new European VC firm based in Paris, is announcing the final closing of its first fund. Eighteen months after the first closing, the Emblem team managed to secure €80 million in total (around $85 million at current exchange rates). This is no small feat in the current funding environment. According to Atomico’s […]
© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
Aiming to accelerate product design with AI, Trace.Space raises a Seed round
Modern product engineering requires the production of highly accurate digital simulations, allowing engineers to create prototypes and understand the real-world performance of materials. Currently, legacy software platforms from companies like IBM and Dassault are generally employed, but — now powered by Generative AI — startups are joining the arena. One such is Trace.Space, coming out of […]
© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
These researchers used NPR Sunday Puzzle questions to benchmark AI ‘reasoning’ models
Every Sunday, NPR host Will Shortz, The New York Times’ crossword puzzle guru, gets to quiz thousands of listeners in a long-running segment called the Sunday Puzzle. While written to be solvable without too much foreknowledge, the brainteasers are usually challenging even for skilled contestants. That’s why some experts think they’re a promising way to […]
© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
Boston Dynamics joins forces with its former CEO to speed the learning of its Atlas humanoid robot
Boston Dynamics Wednesday announced a partnership designed to bring improved reinforcement learning to its electric Atlas humanoid robot. The tie-up is with the Robotics & AI Institute (RAI Institute), earlier known as The Boston Dynamics AI Institute. Both organizations were founded by Marc Raibert, a former MIT professor who served as Boston Dynamics’ CEO for […]
© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
Softbank could soon buy Renee James’ Ampere chip company for about $6.5B
And it’s the latest in an ongoing saga over the company’s future ownership.
© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
Sonos lays off 200 ahead of rumored set-top box release
Sonos announced that it has laid off 200 people in a letter posted to its site Wednesday. The news follows a 100-person layoff in August. Both rounds arrive in the wake of a disastrously botched update to the Sonos app that alienated broad swaths of the premium audio hardware firm’s extremely loyal fanbase. The new […]
© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.